Sapiens by Yuval Noah Harari

 In this NYT bestseller nonfiction, Yuval traces the development of the human species from prehistoric time when it competed with other hominids, to the present, and even into the future.  He posits that human history was marked with several world/changing revolutions: the cognitive revolution, the agricultural revolution, the rise of empire, the industrial revolution, and the future biotechnical revolution. In each of these revolutions, humans gained certain things and lost certain things.  The world as a whole mostly suffered because of the rise of homo sapiens as the dominant species and he believes that humans were probably happier in simpler hunter/gatherer times. He also predicts that humans, as we know them with evolve into a new kind of being that is augmented by technology and bioengineering. 

Harari has a lot of astute observations in his view of the history of the world, and I thought a lot about what he wrote about and his view of modern humans as I read the book. The writing is accessible and engaging. He comes across as well informed and educated but doesn't drift into language that is difficult to understand or jargon that is unfamiliar. As I made my way through the lengthy book, I began to see that his view of life was not at all unbiased.  There were ideas that were clearly important to him, and his world view was slanted to support his beliefs. He is gay, vegetarian, atheist, and practices Buddhist style meditation. These ideas are portrayed as the ideal in his book.  He doesn't dwell on homosexuality that much, but clearly states that there is no reason it isn't as natural as any other sexual behavior, as it shows up among non-human species.  He spends more time deriding the meat production and processing industries as deplorably inhumane, and the belief in God as not only intellectual immature, but also ridiculous and insidious. By the end I felt like the whole book was written to justify his own life choices. Still, I don't regret reading the book and will probably recommend it to others who like philosophical works. (2015, 464 p)